• by Sarah Mahoney  @mahoney_sarah, February 1, 2024

Luxury apparel company Hugo Boss is well along the path to brand reinvention, highlighting what’s new with big marketing moves. Really big, as in 33-foot holographic projections of supermodel Gisele Bündchen and South Korean actor Lee Minho.

While the effort will expand to other influencers in more locations, the company kicked off the giant projections of both Bündchen and Minho in London’s Potters Fields Park, near Tower Bridge, visible for just one night.

Hugo Boss claims that launching a global campaign with such large-scale holograms is a fashion brand first. And it says the colossal activations will pave the way for new opportunities in outdoor advertising.

“The hologram is the most current expression of our exploration and curiosity around harnessing the power of technology in our communications,” says Nadia Kokni, the company’s senior vice president of global marketing and brand communications, in the announcement. “The novelty that it delivers also helps us to create captivating content that's immensely shareable and memorable, offering a new experience to our audiences.”

The #BeYourOwnBOSS effort highlights the line’s spring/summer collections. Ads star faces that are new for the brand, including Bündchen and British model Adwoa Aboah. The campaign also features those who have repped the brand before, including Minho, Italian tennis player Matteo Berrettini and British singer and actress Suki Waterhouse.

The German luxury brand campaign highlights the underlying message of self-determination by shooting talent moving in and out of shadows and light, “poetically demonstrating how formative life choices can be.”

Trey Laird provided the campaign’s creative direction, and Mikael Jansson was the photographer.

The brand’s double B monogram appears on many of the pieces. In the influencer components of the campaign, Boss has enlisted close to 100 celebrities, athletes, and digital influencers to create content for social media, with a “Double B, Every Me” slogan.

This is the company’s latest effort to make sure fashionistas associate Hugo Boss with innovative tech.

Last fall, Hugo Boss named its fashion show “Techtopia,” using robots, holograms and human models to show off the latest looks. The idea was to highlight the rise of AI in hybrid work worlds, including interactive experiences for showgoers and an innovation “Imaginarium.”

The company continues to gain momentum, even as other luxury brands sputter, following the 2022 reinvention that split into separate brands, with Hugo targeting Gen Z and Boss hoping to hook millennials.

In results released several weeks ago, the company posted a 13% increase in sales, setting a record, buoyed by a 33% jump in Asia and 18% in the Americas.

Both Boss and Hugo delivered double-digit gains. Menswear climbed 13%, and revenues for Boss womenswear and Hugo added 14% each. Profits, however, failed to meet expectations, pressured by rising wages and higher interest rates.